If you followed Rob’s tricks for Genie+ this new system will be so easy. Honestly, I like it more as you always have 3 rides booked all the time. Yes, sometimes a Tier 1 is not available BUT if you play the slot is very very probably that you will get. I spent 1 full week at WDW and we rode all that we wanted to and we park hopped 2 times and got the tier 1 in the other park. Thanks Rob and Erick for your amazing work ❤
Rob, thank you for running these experiments. This bodes very well for my upcoming trip where I'm planning to do early entry and a few lightning lanes in the mornings, and head back to our resort where I'll book our afternoon/evening lightning lanes while the kids nap. One thing I was worried about was having to know 7 days ahead of time which parks and attractions we'll want, but this strategy would give us the opportunity to be more spontaneous for our afternoons and evenings.
As of now, it’s been pretty easy to change up your plans on the day of your visit without sacrificing the rides you want to do - it just might require some patience depending on the day. Hopefully this will still be true during the busiest days during the holiday season. 🤞 Thanks for watching! 😃
@@EarScouts we'll be going at the end of January, so hopefully the crowds will be light (though I understand from your videos that there's no rhyme or reason to crowd levels lately). I do anticipate spending a good chunk of time modifying lightning lanes for the afternoon, but I'm hoping I can do that while the kids nap. Although this will be an hour or two later than when you were running experiment 3, so we'll have to see how it works out.
We dismayed when Genie Plus switched to Multi Pass just before our trip because we were looking forward to being spontaneous each day. The new system forced us to plan our first parks of each day 7 days in advance. But we were able to be flexible with the second half of our days when we were there. I also found that it was extremely difficult to modify the LL's booked 7 days out to better times before entering the parks. Also the Multi Pass system will force you not to overlap plans much when booking ahead of time. Once I was tapped into the park, it became easier to modify to better times and overlap LL's better. Good luck and enjoy your trip!
Love that you showed us screen shots for all of these situations. There are so many discrepancies online where people swear that things definitely do or do not happen (with people on both sides). Thanks for showing the proof!! Also, the availability of Tiana day-of is such a relief! I’d love to see more videos like this where you address all of the really unique situations… a “Master Class” maybe 🤣 You are the expert!
Having just come back from a vacation to Disney and using the LLMP, and then going over to Universal where we had the Express Pass, I much prefer Universal's approach. I can go on almost any ride, as many times as a like, whenever I want and use their express pass lanes. I don't need to be on my phone constantly, I didn't need to book ahead of time, I didn't need to get up early, I didn't have to worry about the ride "running out of time slots", it was all just there for me to use and it WAS SIMPLE. Granted I only go to the Orlando area once every 5-10 years, but the difference in approaches was stark, and one was the clear winner over the other, IMO.
I really love that you guys answer the "What happens if we...?" questions. I've been curious about a few of these things myself, although they aren't necessarily issues I'm likely to encounter!
Thanks for doing these. I got 4 kids and if I never found your channel we would not have had the same experience. We’re headed back in March 2025 and appreciate you running experiments and giving us the best tips and tricks. Keep up the great work!
Thank you for always taking time to show us the best tips and for sharing your insights!! My family is going to WDW next month. I'm REALLY interested in seeing how the new system works for a family where half of us love the thrilling rides and the other half want to stick to the more kid-friendly ones. I'm worried about how difficult it will be to book and split the party across different ride types. Thanks again!! LOVE YOUR CHANNEL!!!
Yes, about 6-8 hours late to an early morning Guardians virtual queue. I believe it was something like a 9 am return time and I arrived to the park around 4. Scanned in with a blue(?) light instead of green, but the castmember waved me in no problem
Yes. Depending on the ride, cast members may be in a good mood and let you in if you’re nice! But don’t count on it and please don’t expect it from them! This would be a lot harder if the ride is newer, like Tiana.
Amazing video and so helpful. I had an entire plan based in part on the previous tips you provided. Then I was stressing with the changes but you have made it really easy to understand the dos and don’ts of the new service for a successful day of park hopping!
Thank you! I haven’t been to the parks in 6 weeks so I’ll be using the new lightning lane next month for the first time! Hoping it goes well as I was really accustomed to the genie+
Oh my gosh! Good to know you shouldn’t use someone else’s lightning lane! My son doesn’t like Rock n’roller , i thought there would be no harm in my husband riding twice using my son’s band😬 . I would never think of sharing a magic band to enter the park , but to use a lightning lane , I figured 3 are reserved , 3 are going in, no abuse there. I’m a by-the-book person, thanks for preventing me from breaking the rules ❤
i don't think anyone cares. The cast member isn't going to ask you to verify your ID. A LL was booked, and a body is still using that reservation. It's fine.
Rob - My daughter and I had an incredible trip! We used multi pass for 4 days and had some great luck playing the slots 🎰 The biggest highlights were turning an 8pm Remy's into 10am, and scoring a random late ride on Tiana's 😁 Modify, modify, modify & never lose hope! Thank you for all the tips!!
Glad you're feeling better! Thanks for the great video ☺ I'm guessing you are at Yacht Club working on the soon-to-debut Deluxe resort showdown- very excited for that!! Have a great day!
Glad you're better. My 1st solo trip is later next month, so I'm getting my Covid booster the week. Hope it helps me a little! Thanks for the informative vlog.
We need a full on video for using pass with people that do want to ride some attractions and other people that are afraid to ride those attractions and want to do something different. Because booking everyone in the morning for these attractions, all at once is not ideal
Had a big park hopping day planned for that first weekend. AK, Epcot, and MK. I booked my three for Epcot, and my first was a “throwaway” (9am pixarfest). We tapped in at AK at 8, and at 10 I tried to book at MK. It wouldn’t let me. I kept trying and it didn’t let me book until we tapped in for an Epcot LL. I was really hoping that I had thought of a “hack” 😂. Still had a great day and used LL for 6 rides that day!
Really appreciate your videos. Very helpful for my recent trip. I’ll say a few things I learned when I went last Monday. I bought Multi Lightning Lane for Magic Kingdom first BUT also a Single LL to ride Guardians which is in EPCOT. My worry was that bc I bought the multi for Magic Kingdom I might have issues with getting into Guardians (which was my first ride of the day but a different park) but I was able to get in. Once I got to Magic Kingdom later and rode Tiana’s Bayou, I was able to add other rides to my multi LL. The only hiccups I had was later in the day. I was attempting to book Tower of Terror and finally saw an opening but I had used up all 3 of my LL slots (one for Mickey RR and the other for Smugglers Run). I didn’t really care about the later so I tried to cancel it but for some reason it kept defaulting back to Mickey and ended up canceling that reservation instead 😢 lucky it wasn’t a super busy day and I told the ride cast members my LL was accidentally cancelled (which they said I wasn’t the only one this happened to) and they let me on for the time I had booked. Overall, I think with my LL (multi and single) I was able to book 9 rides and at most waited on line for only 3 rides for my one day in the parks. Again thanks for all the advice. It definitely helps when you’re planning only one day and trying to maximize what you can ride.
Hubby and I were going to take our honeymoon at WDW and planned to stay at Yacht Club! Couldn't afford it directly after the wedding, so we're saving to go after Labor Day in Sept. 2025. (So excited!!) But folks interested in Stormalong Bay (Yacht Club's pool area shared with Beach Club) should note that it is scheduled for maintenance beginning in May 2025 and sounds like it could last a few weeks (if not over a month.) Thank you for all you do to help those of us not in the know plan great trips, Rob (and Eric ;) !) You really help demystify the ins and outs of it all!!! I hope you guys get to play in the parks without working, too!!
Great information, Rob! You really covered all the different scenarios, even some I had not thought of! Thank you so much for all your hard work bringing us this information
Great video, great experiments! We just got home from our trip (we had hoped to run into you to say hi, but it didn't happen). Your tips were very helpful! We found that playing the slots to get a better time or a better ride took much longer than in the Genie Plus days for the popular rides, as you found for Slinky Dog. We also were not aware that you could not use someone else's Magic Band to ride a ride in their place. We booked Cosmic Rewind for 3 of us and our friend backed out of riding it because it gave her motion sickness. So I took her band, rode it, then immediately rode it again with my band. Oops! If that happens to us again, we will go through guest services. Don't want to get thrown out of the parks! We found that we could get pretty much every ride we wanted on Multi Pass as the day went on, although it was much harder later in the day and playing the slots took much longer. I fear people are going to complain a lot about having to spend more time on their phones than they did in the Genie Plus days to get LL's for rides that show as out of them, but it's still early in the day.
Thank you for trialing and erroring for us! We're taking the whole family of 8 in October so we look forward to a video about a large group! Also some strategy videos around park hopping!
To be fair your videos are spot on. I’m from Wales and I’ve watched all the videos you done on gene plus…. Which in the end made no difference because I traveled out 24th July the day they changed to lightning lanes. I did watch some lightning lane videos which are quite similar to gene plus ones, obviously early days but what videos you done on the lightning helped us out. 😅
Thats stress testing to the limit as always. Great work! You mencioned someone succeded in changing, maybe cause theres tier one attractions in the other parks and not animal kingdom perhaps.. cheers. 👍👍🍀🖖
Maybe you have to wait past the grace period when one ride expires and see if it lets you book another ride🤷🏻♂️ … thank you for running these experiments🙏🏼
Thanks for showing the actual screens, Rob, super helpful. Good to know that letting something expire does not unlock the ability to book a ride in another park, but what about in the same park? i.e. if a tier 2 ride expires after you're already in the park, can you book another tier 1?
Thank you, as always, for creating and sharing such great, helpful content! Also, can you school us on how you were holding 4 LL at the same time? And before noon, no less. 😊 I thought you could only ever be holding 3 at one time, but saw you had 2 at AK and 2 at HS at one point. Teach us your ways 👏👏👏
Hello Tess! The Reason Rob had 4 LL showing on the app was because his LL for Everest had expired and, even though it had expired, it still shows. Thanks for watching
Hi Rob, great video! We have just arrived in Florida for two weeks and find your videos really helpful! The kids are hoping they meet you whilst we are here in one of the parks! Have you any plans to be in a particular park on a particular day over the next two weeks? Would be fantastic to meet you and to say hi! Keep up the great work!
So thankful for your channel! It has helped so much in our plans for our first trip coming up FINALLY next week! It is so reassuring to see your luck with Tiana. My husband is desperate to ride that ride and I unfortunately couldn't score a LL for it when I prebooked. I do have a question! We have ILLs booked for Cosmic Rewind with a 9-10am return window; would we also be able to enter the VQ and get to ride twice in one day?
That gremlin about refreshing , and it keeps going to MK?!? I don’t understand! I was in HS on Saturday and was like “why?” And when you click the park you want, it refreshes again lol! I am sure that will be a quick fix for Disney though! Thank you for this video!
Thank you for this amazing video and for running all those experiments. Looking forward to seeing you around in September as I’ll be back in Orlando with my family for some Disney-days. 🙌🏻 Hope I will not be too shy to ask for a selfie 🙈
Thank you for doing this. Very informative. Yes Mermaid Nina Travels says she lets hers expire to make other lightning lanes but everyone else I watched says you can't Not sure how she can..
I've seen her videos too where she does let an unwanted LL expire to get a better pick but you're right...every other video I've seen they say it doesn't work???
Thank you Rob! Always appreciate your videos, they are so helpful and you explain things very well. I was wondering if you could try the new Lightning Lane system with a larger group (5 or more) to see how it compares to the older Genie Plus experience with a large group? We have a trip coming up in January with two families of 5, staying off property, planning on rope dropping and staying as late as we can in the parks.
Thanks for this video. I am feeling a lot more confident for my trip later this week. Wondering if booking a large group is significantly harder to snag lightning lanes!!!
Could you do a video on how to plan a full day at a a park with early entry and extended hours but planning a break back at a hotel/resort and how to time all this? Ty for all your awesome videos!!
Appreciate all the hard work as always, we check in friday at coronado and have all our multipasses booked for week & takes anxiety down a level to see what’s going on prior to arrival Also, i have been modifying my bookings all week to better times lol(shaved a few hours off things) 🍺 Btw do u think it defaulted to magic kingdom since u had Tiana with the highlighted asterisk?
Next year will be my first time buying any sort of lightning lane. When I go to purchase, can I add in the rest of my party so we buy the pass for everyone, or does each member of my party have to buy it? Trying to sort everything out before we go!
I have a question about the last section of the video when at Yacht Club. How do you go around the tier system rule? I thought that you could only choose 1 tier one and 2 tier two’s for the start of your day in a park? It appeared to me that Rob stayed at the resort all day and scheduled 3 LL’s for MK later in the day and all three of his choices were Tier 1. How did that work?
Would you recommend early entry to animal kingdom and booking lightning lanes in Epcot for later in the afternoon? I’m going with my son he’s 2 and I really don’t want to wait for rides. Your videos are so helpful by the way! ❤
It’s why he checked another park, if it opens up to other ride tiers it’s going to be available in other parks too. Basically, they want you tapping in your first ride no matter what before adding a new ride whether thats tier 1 or 2 or in a different park
This is incredibly helpful. Thank you so much for taking the time to do this. Are there any issues booking Lightning Lanes only 3 days out (staying offsite).
Hi Rob - Question, what happens when the reserved window passes for the ride, can the party members that did not tap in, then be added to future group ride reservations?
I was running late to make my first lightning lane for Dinosaur. I was doing my brisk power walk through security and crowds. I made it maybe 4 to 6 minutes after my time expired. The cast member was busy talking to a guest, but the scanner lit up green when i placed my pass on it, soooo I'm guessing maybe there's a grace period if you're running late (i imagine its 5 to 10 minutes. Cant possibly be longer right?) I was hoping to avoid any kind of "its just 5 minutes" convo, hah. But it was fine.
With genie + everyone has the same opportunity to book rides. Resort guest get in 30 mins and in some places 1hr before everyone else plus they get to stay late on certain nights. I think Disney really slapped the locals who keep them busy when tourist don’t come in the face
Hello, I just got from an 8 day stay in Magic kingdom… I didn’t have the same type of success you did. I had to work around dining reservations etc and this proved to be extremely difficult. I really don’t like this system at all as it took away all spontaneity. I’ve been going to Disney for over 40 years since I was a child and now I bring my children. For the first time ever I’ve left my trip feeling defeated and dejected. Honestly I don’t think we will be going back. 😔
Rob, did you find that LL"s booked 3 or 7 days ahead were difficult to modify during the 3 or 7 day window before you were in the park? That was our experience. Nearly impossible to get better times until the day of when we were in the parks. It was frustrating.
Hey, Rob I always thought the grace period for genie+ , fastpass, multipass, etc. Was 5 min before and 15 minutes after. I am surprised to see the light still turn green for you at the safari in this video. How far back are you aware that the grace period changed from 15 min to 20 min, I'm curious about this.
Hi there! Do you have to book each experience for every person in your party? Or can you split a group into two, or even add people in later in the day?
Question… is the new system worth it for partial days? We fly in and can’t get to the parks till 2pm(going to HS) . I know we can get 3 rides 7 days before hand (staying at then dolphin). But I’m worried that we won’t get anything else after that. 3 may still help but 🤷🏼♀️. What do you think?
Is it better to keep a big group together or split into two separate groups? I remember you said groups of 4 or more for Genie+ was difficult to get times. I was wondering if this system works the same way
Hey Rob & Erick & fellow Ear Scouters! I’m planning my first Solo trip, staying 8 days first week of Feb, 2025 at PO Riverside Magnolia Bend… it’s been yrs since I’ve been to WDW in February- you think LLs will even be needed for me to invest??
We land in the morning time and will go straight to MK. I obviously want to book my choices early. Do you know if I book all three early, but say our flight gets delayed therefore not being able to tap into all 3,, will I not be able to book anything for the rest of the day? I know you can’t book until you tap in, but also you only have a certain amount of time to be late. What is the modify rule for that?
Txs rob...question... can we book in 2 diffrent devices at the same time, for 2 days in parallel? I mean while i book for monday my wife book for tuesday...at the same time...for the same party???
Hello Jorge! First of all, thanks for watching. The answer to your question is YES. Actually, that’s the way Rob and I did it the first time we used this new system. You just have to make sure that your party is all linked together :)
We were trying to book 4 days on different devices and kept getting payment errors. We ended up having to use 4 different credit cards (after using a card 1 time, it would no longer work).
Rob - love your efforts and sharing your results!!! So helpful. Wondering if you have any plans to buy MLL day of and try to get biggies.. especially at HS and MK?
The lightning lanes in other parks not showing up seems like a bug - if there's a way to put in a bug report for the app then it might be helpful to do that
Yo Ear Scouts, what if you prebuy the multipass lightining Lane before going to the park and NOT pre book anything. Once you scan into the park, then can you get three tier 1 attractions? Maybe doing the prebook itself handcuffs you.
